Change your Habits now

I

Satsang is purely meant to discuss and explain the subject of contacting the Naam-Power – it is not a place where the social and political matters are taken up. It is not a place of righteousness, and we should regard and respect it as such. When we visit any religious temple, do we not enter with respectful humility? Where our attitude is not so, we surely expect to gain little from our attendance there. To talk of worldly affairs in Sacred Places is considered to be a sacrilege.

So your purpose in coming to Satsang is to imbibe the Love of God, to sit in His sweet remembrance, to unite with Him. All things past and future, all irrelevant matters can be dealt with in your own place of residence. Come, but come with the very best of intentions. Bring the remembrance of the Lord with you, and take it with you when you leave. Do not listen to others conversation and do not talk to anyone unless it is about the Truth. You will thereby gain full benefit from Satsang – otherwise the years will pass by without any real advancement.

Swami Ji Maharaj tells us,

Many days of attendance at Satsang have passed; now give up your old habits.

So much time has been spent at Satsang without gaining the benefit. Only by having full attention focused will you receive. If the words enter through one ear and leave from the other, nothing will be retained. Further more, if you live up to what you hear, that will be a great achievement, otherwise your purpose in joining the Satsang will have failed.

Swami Ji says,

Oh man, let anybody attend the Satsang in the accurate way from today.

How to attend Satsang? When you leave home for Satsang, forget all worldly matters and go in sweet remembrances of the Master and so long as you attend the Satsang you should not think of anything else except the Master and God.

If your body is in the Master’s company, but your mind is elsewhere; Kabir says, how can you colour an unbleached cloth?

Even though you may not understand all that is said, yet if you sit with full attention you will profit by it. If your thoughts are somewhere else, not only will you lose, but other people will also be affected by the impure atmosphere you are creating, for thoughts are living and possess great power. Regard the Satsang as a place of purity; do not talk or think of anything but God, and whosoever attends will be blessed by the uplifting atmosphere. We do not go to Satsang to meet our friends or to socialise.

The Master unites us in a True Relationship, which can never be broken.

This relationship is with God Himself, Who is manifested in the human form. It is such a relationship that can never be sundered, even after death, not to speak of during life. But we, with our poor understanding, assert ourselves with pride, ego and low habits, desiring to be recognised. Consequently, we succeed only in heaping more misery upon our heads. What is the use of attending Satsang for so long if you are not going to change the old unwanted habits? Dry land can become green again by giving it water, but of what use is land that is watered yet remains dead? Your attendance has become a mere routine – you cannot get salvation by rote – you will not get it, you will not get it.

Try to understand what the Spiritual Path means, and then live up to it; and the more it seeps into your heart, the happier you will be.

Let the words of the Guru abide in your heart, and you abide in Him.

This is the only way, the only hope. If you do not obey Him, what can be done? For so many years I have led you. That which you receive here you will not find anywhere else – but with all that you receive yet you continue in your old ways of enmity, avarice, jealousy, etc. – you do not keep your Spiritual Diaries – whose fault is it that you are not progressing? Stop being childish and grow up. Those who do not wish to listen and obey should not enter upon this venture of the Spiritual Path. I am not saying any new thing. We are not all Saints – we have come here to become that, and you will become that if you fully understand and then live up to the teachings.

Everyone makes mistakes. I remember, I went on leave form my office once, and on returning found that two clerks had been dismissed. When I took their case to the Controller for appeal, he began to question the merit of it, but I asked him,

Is there any person without faults? You will not find anyone who has not done something wrong, and the punishment for mistakes should not be dismissal, for not only the man will suffer, but his wife and children also.

They were reinstated in service. If these teachings are no new thing, then try to fully understand them now, and take them into your lives. If we could learn to obey and keep the diary, we would become gods and goddesses. Do not discuss or wrangle intellectually over the subject, but think carefully – have you not come here to keep the company of Truth? Then why keep the company of others? This disease has ever been in evidence, and will continue, but the Master’s come to prescribe the cure by making us realise the Truth.